Hilton Hotels & Resorts will work with China's largest property developer by sales, Country Garden Holdings Co. Ltd., to revamp Hilton's mainland China business strategy and attract more domestic long-stay guests and overcome the decline in tourism as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.
Hilton, once majority owned by China's HNA Group Co., will build around 1,000 new hotels over the next 10 years. Unlike its existing properties the new hotels will cater mainly to long-stay guests.
The new hotels, to be branded Home2 Suites by Hilton, are a shift in the company's approach to its hospitality business in China. They will also be the company's first extended-stay establishments in its second-largest market.
Hilton and Country Garden plan to build around 411 hotels for long-stay guests within the next two years. The first hotels will reportedly offer more than 43,000 rooms to domestic long-stay guests in several cities. The deal with Country Garden is for 1,000 hotels, Hilton's Asia-Pacific president Alan Watts said.
The travel landscape in mainland China has evolved with the spread of the coronavirus pandemic, Watts said. Long-term stays have become very popular for domestic travelers, he said. Therefore, Hilton is adapting by offering products that serve the immediate needs of the evolving industry.
Hilton currently has 257 hotels with more than 65,000 rooms in mainland China. It wants to increase that to at least 300 by the end of the year. The latest hotel under construction is the company's Waldorf Astoria in Xiamen.
Other hotel companies have jumped into the latest hospitality trends in China. Marriott announced plans to build between 40 and 50 new long-stay hotels this year and around 100 by the end of 2021. Domestic tourism in China has rebounded this year after the government eased domestic travel restrictions.
